Morrie Turner and the Kids by Jeff Chang How the first nationally syndicated African American cartoonist rose out of the stew of U.S. comics’ racial fascination and debasement.

The Fifth Wedding by Michelle Tea Two outlaw participants in the 2009 Venice Biennale marry feminism, pornography, the ocean, and each other.

The Rhinoceros in the Hall by Alan Michael Parker What’s the role of the museum—and searing aural pain—in the the democratization of culture?

FULL TEXT The Disappearance of Ford Beckman by Michael Paul Mason The evolution, downfall, and comeback of an artist undefeated by market crashes, Krispy Kreme Doughnuts, and the IRS. FULL TEXT Discover Kymaerica by Michael A. Elliott A guide to the vast alternate universe created by the grandson of Charles and Ray Eames. Jerry Moriarty in conversation with Chris Ware Ware, the master of emotionally devastating comics, talks to a painter whose work he finds “unmatched for its accessibility and humanity.”

Aline Kominsky-Crumb interviewed by Hillary Chute “The fact that I’d dare to put my flat scratching on the same page with a master like that, they thought that it was incredibly nervy.”

FULL TEXT Peter Blegvad interviewed by Franklin Bruno Blegvad is an artist whose output—from newspaper comics to Marxist prog-rock—is difficult to place on the high-low continuum. Andrea Zittel interviewed by Katie Bachner Zittel’s artworks are experiments—breeding chickens, building a fifty-ton floating island—that test the idea that every gesture is creative.

I Am Astonished at the Sunflowers Spinning: A new poem by Derek Walcott

Sedaratives by Elizabeth Beckwith

Musin’s and Thinkin’s by Jack Pendarvis

Creative Accounting: Two Photographs by Chris Benz

Real Life Rock Top Ten by Greil Marcus

“Comics” edited by Alvin Buenaventura

Schema: Forensic Sketches of Literary Criminals by Joshua Cohen